Gov’t refuses leading role on urban renewal, but agrees to provide support
The government has again ruled out the notion of taking a leading role on urban renewal projects. Members of the executive, including the Secretary for Transport and Public Works, Raimundo do Rosário, yesterday communicated the government’s position to the members of the Second Standing Committee of the Legislative Assembly (AL).
The Secretary was leading a group of government representatives in a meeting with the lawmakers comprising the committee responsible for discussing the policies and principles of the Urban Renewal bill.
At the meeting, and against the opinion of some lawmakers, who wished for the government to take a more interventionist approach to urban renewal projects, the members of the executive reaffirmed that urban renewal, namely works involving building reconstruction, must be led by the private owners of such buildings with the agreement of those involved, the president of the committee, Chan Chak Mo, told the media in a briefing following the meeting.
Nonetheless, Chan also said that the government accepted some of the suggestions from the lawmakers, namely on the provision of more support to the urban renewal projects to facilitate the process for building owners and accelerate the procedures.
In issue are Articles 3 and 4 of the bill, the first noting that building reconstruction must be led by the owners and the second noting the support and participation of the government from the process through the Macau Urban Renewal company (MUR).
According to Chan, the government is available to provide additional support from other government departments including the Land, Public Works, and Transport Bureau.
“The government will not negotiate with the unit owners or acquire the buildings or anything of this kind but said that it can facilitate the works and provide information on technicians and technical aspects of the process as well as in the licensing procedures. The government can help but the responsibility for the urban renewal projects will always be [that of] the owners,” Chan explained. “There are people that believe that [it] should be the government taking the lead but the government reaffirmed their role is [only] to pay support and to help,” he added.
Building Reconstruction
Another of the items discussed during yesterday’s meeting had to do with the clarification as to whether the building reconstruction is related to single buildings or to an area, which can include two or more buildings at the same time.
According to the government, both options are valid and can occur as long as there are no mixed purposes of the plots of land involved.
“This can be done but must obey the urban planning laws and regulations because different land plots have been assigned with different purposes. [Such a matter] also depends on the Urban Master Plan and what it settled for that particular area. But the government did not discard both possibilities, one building or an area,” Chan said.
Questioned by the media as to whether, aside from the buildings of Iao Hon previously mentioned as being preferential targets for the start of urban renewal, there were any other buildings or areas of focus, Chan said, “We don’t know yet. Only after the [Urban] Master Plan is in force we can see clearly. This will depend on the change of purpose of the land plots and other matters that will be established by the Master Plan. Only after the plan is fully implemented we will be able to have a clear picture.”
Now the two juridical advisories from the AL and government will discuss technical matters of the bill together before a further meeting of the committee to address the articles one by one in further detail.
